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  • Taxpayers deserve better performance audits of school construction bonds

    Taxpayers deserve better performance audits of school construction bonds


    Photo: Carol Davis/Flickr

    California public school and community college district voters approved $20 billion of construction loans in 2022, with more passing in 2023, using the Proposition 39 financing capability.  The California Association of Bond Oversight Committees (CABOC) estimates that a total of $197.8 billion of this type of construction loan now exists.

    Proposition 39 made it easier to pass bond measures, but it also created a new emphasis on vigorous taxpayer oversight of construction expenditures. Indeed, when Proposition 39 was presented to the voters, the Legislature created a quid pro quo scenario, reducing the bond approval level to 55% from two-thirds, but requiring extensive taxpayer oversight and public visibility.  

    This oversight includes a performance audit that “… shall be conducted in accordance with the Government Auditing Standards issued by the Comptroller General of the United States for financial and performance audits.”   Education code section 15286

    When a standards-compliant performance audit is not present, however, laws can be broken, crimes committed, and voters are left to conclude that their tax money is not being spent wisely.  A search engine’s worth of indictments, allegations and plea deals are discoverable on the internet, relating to school districts and construction. This is in addition to the traditional occurrence of excessive change orders, cost overruns and delivery delays.

    For instance, the state’s Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team (FCMAT) uncovered evidence of fraud, misappropriation or other illegal activities in 65% of the “extraordinary audits” it conducted between 2018 and 2023. While not all construction related, these cases were referred to law enforcement authorities. 

    In Santa Barbara County, an assistant school district superintendent and three construction company executives were charged with 74 counts of misappropriation of public monies, embezzlement of public funds, diversion of construction funds and grand theft. In San Francisco, a former school district facilities manager overseeing a district construction account pleaded guilty to fraud and tax evasion in an alleged scheme to divert $500,000 out of a construction escrow account.

    But the greater mystery may be when there is no oversight performance audit and wrong-doing goes unexamined.

    A statewide compliance survey released in October 2022 revealed that performance audits produced by most school districts fail to sufficiently comply with the required standards, according to a common sense, reasonable evaluation. Missing and non-standards-compliant performance audits deprive the public and those overseeing construction bond programs of valuable information that could be used to meaningfully evaluate the expenditure of hundreds of millions of dollars of public funds. 

    Many performance audits are just over two-pages in length, and include a single compliance audit objective. They typically fail to audit or provide information on program effectiveness and results, internal control or any prospective analysis of the construction program, which is usually the largest construction program ever undertaken by a school district.

    The comptroller general’s government auditing standards manual describes how government officials, such as school districts, should use a performance audit to assure the public that its money is well-spent. These standards describe the categories of audit objectives: program effectiveness and results; internal control; compliance; and prospective analysis. It also lists 32 examples of audit objectives, illustrating each of the four categories. This information provides objective analysis, findings and conclusions in order to improve program performance and operations, reduce costs and increase public accountability.

    School and community college districts engaging firms to produce the Proposition 39 performance audits should include audit objectives from a broad array of audit categories, so that the public truly understands the expenditure of billions of dollars of taxpayer funds.

    And taxpayers should carefully review the Proposition 39 construction bond program documents of their school and community college districts, including the performance audit, which are required by law to be posted on district websites.

    •••

    Bryan Scott serves on two citizens’ bond oversight committees in Brentwood, and in 2023 he was named the Member of the Year by the California Association of Bond Oversight Committees.  He is the creator of “Becoming an Effective Watchdog: A Necessary Primer for California School Construction Bond Oversight.”

    The opinions expressed in this commentary represent those of the author. If you would like to submit a commentary, please review our guidelines and contact us.





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  • Teaching performance assessments strengthen instruction and improve student outcomes; let’s not change that  

    Teaching performance assessments strengthen instruction and improve student outcomes; let’s not change that  


    A kindergarten teacher helps a girl and boy with a class activity.

    Photo by Allison Shelley for EDUimages

    Learning the art and skill of effective instruction starts long before a teacher’s first job in the classroom. Aspiring educators begin honing their craft in preparation programs that tie clinical practice to coursework on best teaching methods, including how to teach students to read.  

    Since 2002, this process has been reinforced in California by an embedded teaching performance assessment (TPA) as a key measure of professional readiness. A TPA directs teacher preparation candidates to provide evidence of their teaching knowledge and skills. This is accomplished through classroom videos, lesson plans, student work, and analysis of teaching and learning for English learners, students with disabilities, and the full range of students they are teaching.  

    The tasks TPAs require are the core work of teaching. Studies over the last two decades show that TPAs are educative for candidates and predictive of future effectiveness. Furthermore, the feedback they provide focuses educator preparation programs on preparing teachers in ways that are formative and learner-centered.  

    Thus, it is deeply concerning to the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing (CTC) and many in the field that this rich measure of teacher preparation would be eliminated with the passage of Senate Bill 1263, which would repeal all requirements relating to teaching performance assessments, including that future teachers demonstrate their readiness to teach reading.   

    The TPA is California’s only remaining required measure of whether a prospective teacher is ready to teach prior to earning a credential. All other exam requirements for a teaching credential have been modified by the Legislature to allow multiple ways for future teachers to demonstrate basic skills and subject matter competence. These legislative actions have been supported in large part by the requirement that student teachers complete a TPA to earn a credential. 

    Elimination of the TPA would leave California with no consistent standard for ensuring that all teachers are ready to teach before entering our classrooms. We would join only a handful of states that have no capstone assessment for entry into teaching. Passage of SB 1263 would also result in the state losing a key indicator of how well educator preparation programs are preparing a diverse and effective teaching force. 

    In 2021, the Legislature passed Senate Bill 488, which revamped how teacher preparation programs will instruct candidates to teach reading. As a result, the Reading Instruction Competence Assessment (RICA) is slated to be replaced by a newly designed literacy performance assessment currently being piloted for incorporation into the TPA by July 1, 2025.  

    Participant feedback on the new literacy performance assessment (LPA) piloted this spring is optimistic. One teaching candidate shared that the LPA “was a vital learning experience when it comes to implementing foundational literacy instruction with young learners. I enjoyed that it’s a more hands-on experience for the students to be engaged and promotes full participation of the student and teacher.” A teacher said that the LPA “provided multiple opportunities for my candidate to reflect and observe exceptional moments as well as missed opportunities in the lesson. It encouraged conversations about how to implement direct, explicit instruction.” A university faculty member observed that the LPA pilot “has been a learning experience for the candidates and the program. … It shows what we are doing well and what other areas we need to create or enhance to support our candidates’ knowledge and skills in teaching literacy.” 

    If the TPA and RICA are eliminated, California will no longer have an assessment of new teachers’ capacity to teach reading, and we will have lost a valuable tool that can inform programs about how they can improve. 

    Recent Learning Policy Institute research demonstrates that TPA scores reflect the quality of teacher preparation candidates have received in terms of clinical support and preparation to teach reading and math (for elementary and special education candidates). Most programs support their candidates well. The study found that nearly two-thirds of teacher preparation programs had more than 90% of their candidates pass a TPA and showed no significant differences in passing rates by race and ethnicity. 

    As Aaron Davis, teacher induction director at William S. Hart Union High School District in Santa Clarita noted, “The TPA serves a very necessary purpose in creating a sound foundation for which a new teacher’s practice can grow with the mindset of having a positive impact on every student.”  While the TPA requires time and effort to implement, it ensures that new teachers are prepared to start their career as an educator on day one, he said. 

    While the pandemic made it challenging to administer TPAs, most programs now ensure that more than 90% of candidates pass the TPA. The CTC is working with the small number of programs that struggle to adequately support their candidates.  

    The elimination of TPAs would unravel decades of progress to focus teacher education on clinical practice and ensure programs consistently meet standards for preparing teachers who are ready to teach.  

    Rather than eliminate the last common measure of an aspiring teacher’s preparedness, we recommend the Legislature uphold the future of a well-prepared teacher workforce by supporting the commission’s commitment to continuously review and update the TPA and to work to support program improvement. Doing so will maintain the quality and effectiveness of new teachers as they embark on their journey to provide the most effective and equitable learning experiences for all students. 

    •••

    Marquita Grenot-Scheyer is chair of the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing and professor emeritus in the College of Education at California State University, Long Beach.

    Mary Vixie Sandy is executive director of the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing, an agency that awards over 250,000 credential documents per year and accredits more than 250 colleges, universities, and local education agencies offering educator preparation programs.

    The opinions in this commentary are those of the authors. If you would like to submit a commentary, please review our guidelines and contact us.





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  • Research casts doubt on proposed legislation ending teaching performance assessments

    Research casts doubt on proposed legislation ending teaching performance assessments


    Senate Bill 1263 will be heard by the full Assembly if it makes it through the Assembly Appropriations Committee.

    Credit: AP Photo/Terry Chea

    A bill wending its way through the California State Legislature could remove a valuable tool to evaluate teacher preparation programs, according to research conducted by the Learning Policy Institute, a nonprofit research organization headed by State Board of Education President Linda Darling-Hammond.

    Senate Bill 1263, sponsored by the California Teachers Association, would do away with teaching performance assessments (TPA), which require teachers to demonstrate competence via video clips of classroom instruction, lesson plans, student work and written reflections on their practice before they can earn a preliminary teaching credential.

    The legislation could also remove the last test that teachers are required to take to prove they are prepared to teach.

    Supporters of the bill say the assessments are expensive and stressful for teacher candidates, duplicate other requirements they must fulfill to enter the profession, are ineffective at preparing teachers for the classroom and result in fewer people becoming teachers — especially people of color.

    TPA data could help improve preparation

    Recent research from the Learning Policy Institute offers another view. It found that candidates who passed the TPA were more likely to be in programs that offered better preparation and more support. Eliminating TPAs would make it difficult to know which programs need support from the state. Instead, the assessment data could be better used to strengthen preparation statewide, it concluded.

    “This research was an attempt to understand what may explain that variation and found that certain types of preparation experiences are associated with better performance on a TPA,” said Susan Kemper Patrick, the author of the study.  

    “Overall, preservice candidates were more likely to be successful on a TPA compared to internship candidates. Candidates attending programs offering certain types of support and preparation experiences were also more likely to be successful on a TPA.”

    The Learning Policy Institute study does not examine the relationship between passing rates on the TPA and teacher performance or student achievement. California doesn’t typically tie student achievement to teacher identifiers. 

    Teacher candidates are currently required to pass either the California Teaching Performance Assessment (CalTPA), the Educative Teaching Performance Assessment (edTPA) or the Fresno Assessment of Student Teachers (FAST).

    A previous narrowly focused study of the Performance Assessment for California Teachers — the precursor of the edTPA — indicated that scores on that test predicted student achievement gains, according to the report. Research from other states has also shown that scores on teaching performance assessments can predict teaching effectiveness. 

    The assessment is usually completed during student teaching, residencies or internships, allowing candidates and their preparation programs to identify strengths and weaknesses in instruction, according to the policy institute study. 

    “I feel like that (the report) sort of documents what we already suspected, which is that teacher credential programs vary in quality, and we know that there are some that are not doing a very good job of preparing teachers to teach.”

    Brian Rivas, Education Trust-West

    Learning Policy Institute researchers analyzed surveys taken by 18,455 candidates who had completed a teacher preparation program and had taken a teaching performance assessment between Sept. 1, 2021 and Aug. 31, 2023. They found that passing rates on the assessments varied across teacher preparation programs. During the two-year period, nearly two-thirds of the 263 programs analyzed had more than 90% of their tested candidates pass the assessment, and 23% had all candidates pass. Fourteen programs had passing rates under 67%. 

    Two-thirds of the people surveyed, who had completed teacher preparation programs to teach elementary and secondary school, reported feeling well- or very well-prepared for their TPA, 22% felt adequately prepared and 11% felt they were not prepared. The more prepared candidates felt, the higher their TPA passing rates.  

    Some have called the performance assessment a barrier to a diverse teacher workforce, but the policy institute research shows that disparities in passage rates by race and ethnicity are minimal. There were no significant differences in pass rates by race and ethnicity in programs with passing rates above 90%, according to the report.

    “I feel like that (the report) sort of documents what we already suspected, which is that teacher credential programs vary in quality, and we know that there are some that are not doing a very good job of preparing teachers to teach,” said Brian Rivas, senior director of policy and government for the Education Trust-West, a social justice and advocacy organization.

    Rivas expressed concern that, without a teacher performance assessment, educators who attended low-performing preparation programs will end up teaching the state’s most vulnerable students.

    “We think because of the turnover in low-income communities and communities serving students of color, that they are going to be more likely to be taught by the teachers that are not really prepared fully to teach,” he said.

    Currently, TPA passage rates are tracked by the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing, which offers staff support to programs with low passing rates through the accreditation process. Instead of eliminating the assessment, the report calls for more resources and opportunities for improvement for teachers and programs. 

    Bill to end TPA to be heard by Assembly

    SBill 1263 has passed the state Senate and will next be heard in the Assembly committees on education and higher education. The legislation, as amended, also eliminates the requirement that teachers pass an exam proving reading instruction proficiency.

    It is the latest in a long line of legislation to reduce the number of assessments teachers have to take to earn a credential. In July 2021, legislators gave teacher candidates the option to take approved coursework instead of the California Basic Education Skills Test, or CBEST, or the California Subject Examinations for Teachers, or CSET. 

    Last summer, legislators passed SB 488, which replaced the unpopular Reading Instruction Competence Assessment, also known as RICA, with a literacy performance assessment. The Commission on Teacher Credentialing has developed the assessment over the last year with the help of a work group of literacy experts. 

    In January’s tentative budget, Gov. Gavin Newsom proposed eliminating the CBEST and allowing the completion of a bachelor’s degree to satisfy the state’s basic skills requirement. If it is passed in the budget, and SB 1263 becomes law, candidates will no longer have to take a licensure test to become a credentialed teacher. 

     “A survey of more than 1,000 educators showed strong consensus that the TPAs do not help in preparing educators for the classroom,” said Leslie Littman, California Teachers Association vice president. 

    “What does help to prepare educators is collaborating in classrooms with mentor teachers, working with clinical support supervisors, and quality teacher preparation programs. In fact, elements from this latest study from LPI underscore the value of teacher preparation programs including clinical support and content-specific preparation.”





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  • California takes a big step in how it measures school performance, but there’s still more to do

    California takes a big step in how it measures school performance, but there’s still more to do


    Credit: Alison Yin / EdSource

    Accountability has been a central plank in California’s — and our nation’s — school reform efforts for over two decades. Over nearly that entire period, California has been criticized (including by me) for being one of the few states that does not include a measure of student achievement growth in our accountability system. The current approach, exemplified in the California School Dashboard, rates schools on their average performance levels on the state’s standardized tests, and on the difference between the school’s average performance this year and last year.

    But the state doesn’t have, and has never had, a student-level growth model for test scores. Student-level growth models are important because they do a much better job than the state’s existing measures of capturing school effectiveness at improving student achievement. This is because growth models directly compare students to themselves over time, asking how much individual children are learning each year and how this compares across schools and to established benchmarks for annual learning. The crude difference models the state currently displays in the dashboard could give the wrong idea about school performance, for instance, if there are enrollment changes over time in schools (as there have been since the pandemic).

    Growth models can help more fairly identify schools that are often overlooked because they are getting outsize results with underserved student groups. In other words, they send better, more accurate signals to report card users and to the state Department of Education about which schools need support and for which students. Along with Kansas, California has been the last holdout state in adopting a report card that highlights a growth model.

    Though the state’s task force on accountability and continuous improvement, on which I served, wrapped up its work and recommended a growth model almost nine years ago, the process of adopting and implementing a growth model has been — to say the least — laborious and drawn-out. Still, I was delighted to see that the California Department of Education (CDE) has finally started providing growth model results in the California School Dashboard! This is a great step forward for the state.

    Beyond simply including the results in the dashboard, there are some good things about how the state is reporting these growth model results. The growth model figures present results in a way I think many users will understand (points above typical growth), and results for different student groups can be easily viewed and compared.

    There is a clear link to resources to help understand the growth model, too. The state should be commended for its efforts to make the results clear and usable in this way.

    It doesn’t take a detailed look at the dashboard to see, however, that there are some important fixes that the State Board of Education should require — and CDE should adopt — as soon as possible. Broadly, I think these fixes fall into two categories: technical fixes about presentation and data availability, and more meaningful fixes about how the growth model results are used.

    First, the data are currently buried too deeply for the average user to even find them. As far as I can tell, the growth model results do not appear on the landing page for an individual school. You have to click through using the “view more details” button on some other indicator, and only then can you see the growth model results. The growth model results should, at minimum, be promoted to the front page, even if they are put alongside the other “informational purposes indicator” for science achievement. A downloadable statewide version of the growth model results should also be made available, so that researchers and other interested analysts can examine trends. Especially in light of the long shadow of Covid on California’s students, we need to know which schools could benefit from more support to recover.

    Second, the state should prioritize the growth model results in actually creating schools’ dashboard ratings. Right now, the color-coded dashboard rating is based on schools’ status (their average scale score) and change (the difference between this year’s average score and last year’s). It would be much more appropriate to replace the change score with these growth model results.

    There are many reasons why a growth model is superior, but the easiest to understand is that the “change” metrics the state currently uses can be affected by compositional changes in the student body (such as which kinds of students are moving into and out of the school). Researchers are unanimous that student-level growth models are superior to these change scores at accurately representing school effectiveness. Even for California’s highly mobile student population, growth models can accommodate student mobility and give “credit” to the schools most responsible for each child’s learning during that academic year.

    To be sure, I think there are other ways the dashboard can likely be improved to make it more useful to parents and other interested users. These suggestions have been detailed extensively over the years, including in a recent report that dinged the state for making it difficult to see how children are recovering post-Covid.

    The adoption of a growth model is a great sign that the state wishes to improve data transparency and utility for California families. I hope it is just the first in a series of improvements in California’s school accountability systems.

    •••

    Morgan Polikoff is a professor at the University of Southern California’s Rossier School of Education.

    The opinions expressed in this commentary represent those of the author. EdSource welcomes commentaries representing diverse points of view. If you would like to submit a commentary, please review our guidelines and contact us.





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